Letters From Home

I like this alot...this shows such an important moment in the life of a soldier.

I agree...Silfor is way better than WS for clumps of grassI have a spare M1 Garand and an unholstered .45 from the Tamiya WWII weapons set. PM me you address and you can either or both of them.

All good remarks here.  Alot of it was having to work with what I had on hand.  The blood would be almost right if it were to represent fresh blood,  but it's not.  I tried to make it look a bit like it's not fresh but rather still wet if that makes sense.  The reasons behind why he could be bleeding are numerous, it's not a perfect world.  Perhaps he was sutured, and then got smacked in the head(I've had it happen) who knows. 

The position of the hand, wile research natural human position instead of photographs of people trying to look relaxed and also from myself the hand may appear to be funny since it is not drooped down lower, but in reality the hand drooped way down is fairly inaccurate, and the hand more up like it is given the position of his arm on his leg is actually quite accurate.

Was my first time working with the grass.  There is still the possibility that I can do the drill and stuff, but probably when I dig up my solfor grass which is still packed away I will end up using that instead.

As for the feet, sometimes they just need some air, even if it's still wet.  Really it wasn't meant so much to look like mud as it is dirt.  I would have used differnt colors if I had them on hand but the right colors were either out, or dried up, and I am unable to get anymore at this time.  The glossiness is from the lighting, he is quite flat when viewed up close.

Thanks for the tips on the grass, that is something I'll definately use for future reference if I use it again, and might use it to correct this one, if I don't switch to silfor grass.  Overall it was a scene and an emotion I was trying to convey rather then a strictly accurate figure.  The feet in the water is something I would have loved to of done, but this is how the figure came,  If I can dig up an American rifle(all I seem to have is German) I will probably lay that on the ground next to him.  I may scratchbuild a pistol for him since I own a 1911A1 clone, and I know the differences between the originals and the clones.  This is my first resin figure, and it looks far better than the styrene ones.  I may be alot slower at doing kits now as I think I am a convert to resin figs.  LOL.

*EDIT*

Looking at the pics again, the blood looks nowhere near that bright.  I was tired when I did the adjustments in photoshop, and wasn't paying attention to it.  Everything looks alot more "right" with it when looking at the fig itself.  I'll post some more pics when I have time to set things up to make it look like the actual fig itself.

Good effort.

Few thoughts;

Overall, he looks pretty glossy, but that might be the lighting. In general, try push your highlights and shadows more. The clothes and skin look pretty monochromatic, especially that hands. More shadows between the fingers.

The blood doesn't work on his face for the rest of the scene. Keep the bandage, but eliminate the blood. If he were still bleeding that hard with a dressng in place, he'd be triaged for sutures. The color of the blood is also a bit Peckinpah bright. Go for a deeper maroon except for very fresh arterial blood against white cloth. Venous blood is very dark.

The uniform looks pretty dark, a lighter, greener base would be good.

Theleft hand looks awkward in that position. When modifying a figure, try to assume the position you're working on in a mirror (or have someone take a digital picture of yourself) and see how it looks.

Becareful of getting paint onto the edge of the sleeves.

The mud and bare feet: the mud doesn't look right to me. It's done well but why would he remove his boots to get his feet all muddied? A brook, stream or pond's edge with his feet in the water might work better.

The clump of grass near his right foot looks good. The others are a bit too evenly cut. When using WS long grass, I like to take a clump and fold it in half and insert the base in a pre-drilled hole  in the base. If I need to trim this, I always hold the scissors at a steep angle so the strands in the middle are the tallest and  nothing is cut straight across the tops.

looks like a winner to me!